city's inventory of industrial property at twice the total of the county's No. 2 industrial hub, Bensenville.

"We have tremendous potential for more industrial growth," declares Steven Lakics, West Chicago's mayor for the past two years and a full-time city firefighter. "Kerr-McGee restrained development here for many years, but we notice a new and different attitude now on the part of developers."

Adds Don Kopriva, editor of the Lombard-based DuPage Business Ledger, "We're seeing a real westward migration through the county. There's more and more activity in and around West Chicago. Retail, office and industrial development are all following homebuilders to the area."

In 1994's biggest Chicago-area industrial transaction, LaGrou Distribution Systems Inc., a Southwest Side warehouse and shipment center for area supermarkets, acquired a 735,000-square-foot AT&T Corp. plant in West Chicago that had been slated for shutdown. LaGrou also acquired an adjacent 80-acre parcel for future development.

Most trucking specialists prefer to be near an interstate highway interchange. In West Chicago, however, the closest interchange, at Interstate 88, is about six miles away.

"Access here is very tolerable, and the land prices are substantially more affordable than anything we found to the east," says Tim Kelly, LaGrou's property manager, who says his firm hopes to develop another 1 million square feet of industrial space on its empty parcel. "West Chicago won't grow overnight, but it's obvious that the trend of development is in this direction."

However, some longtime residents are skeptical of such optimism. They've heard the promises before:

In 1983, a powerful development consortium that included Arizona's Del E. Webb Corp. laid plans for a massive high-technology complex housing 100 companies. The plan never went anywhere.

A few years later, Fermilab was the leading candidate to land the $6-billion Superconducting Super Collider. It went to Texas instead.

Four years ago, then-Mayor Paul Netzel offered the Chicago Bears 700 acres of free land to build a replacement for Soldier Field. The Bears didn't take the offer seriously.

Now, the resolution of the Kerr-McGee dispute even has some of the skeptics predicting a new image for West Chicago.

From the pre-World War II era until the early 1970s, the Kerr-McGee factory, located near downtown, produced gaslight mantles. Thorium waste, a byproduct of the manufacturing process, was thought to be harmless, but later found to be highly radioactive and potentially cancer-causing.

The energy company balked at a cleanup, insisting it could seal the site instead. But a determined citizens group won a government-ordered removal of more than 80,000 tons of contaminated surface material last year.

Next comes the removal of underground wastes, which will begin later this year.

"For many years, West Chicago had a bad image because of the Kerr-McGee problem," concedes Mary Randle, executive director of the West Chicago Chamber of Commerce and Industry. "A number of Realtors complained that it was difficult to sell homes in this town. But that has changed so much over the past year."

Other things have changed.

In a referendum last year, voters approved raising taxes earmarked for crime fighting. Officials at DuPage Airport, which West Chicago annexed in the 1980s, have proposed longer runways to enable big corporate jets to use the facility. The city also is debating a major urban renewal project involving four blighted blocks near downtown.

And the once-troubled local school system has won state awards for excellence over the past 18 months.

Residential developers are impressed by the turnabout.

Naperville-based Oliver-Hoffmann Corp. is having 480 acres annexed to the city where it plans to build 1,080 houses and a 120-acre industrial park.

Most of the houses will start at $200,000. That would have been expensive for the largely blue-collar West Chicago until a few years ago, when new subdivisions sporting names such as Willow Creek and Forest Trails began sprouting, with houses in the $300,000 range.

"Twenty years ago, there wouldn't have been a market for our development in West Chicago," acknowledges Raymond Kopp, an Oliver-Hoffman vice-president. "But there's not all that much else left in DuPage County now. As a result, a town like West Chicago finds itself in a nice position."

Because there is so much land, industrial real estate prices have remained moderate. Improved raw land in Carol Stream, 10 minutes to the east, runs $4.50 to $6 a square foot, compared with $2 to $2.50 in West Chicago. Even land in industrial parks in Aurora can rarely be found for less than $3.50 a square foot.

Steven Morken, president of Morken Industrial Realty Inc., last July moved his firm's headquarters from Addison, where it had been based for 16 years, to West Chicago to be close to the action.

"The DuPage Airport expansion will only make this area more attractive, particularly to companies setting up branch offices here with the idea of making visits from headquarters on corporate aircraft," he says. "I expect to see a lot of activity here over the next eight to 10 years."

The city is girding for the onslaught.

Officials have ordered a special census this year, expecting the 1990 total of 14,900 to have swelled by at least 2,000 people. A downtown tax-increment financing district helped lure a dozen new retail businesses during 1994 alone, and an active facade rehabilitation campaign has given the central business district a Victorian, turn-of-the-century look.

But the four-block urban renewal project is bound to be controversial because it could displace about 570 apartment dwellers and cost $10 million or more. Considerable opposition has already been organized.

"There is a lot of dilapidation in the buildings there," says Mr. Tague, the director of economic development. "But for now, we're studying several alternatives for the area."

Meantime, West Chicago is work- ing hard to shake off the confusion caused by its name. Officials have even considered changing it, although no acceptable substitute has been offered.

While some nearby communities lack the infrastructure to support industrial and residential growth, West Chicago doesn't have that problem.

Its wastewater treatment plant operates at less than half its capacity most days, according to the mayor. Annexations have given the city additional well sites for water pumping stations. And three rail lines intersect here, giving local companies more shipping choices.

"West Chicago has required some patience waiting for development to arrive," says Joseph Abel, executive director of the Glen Ellyn Economic Development Corp. and former director of planning for DuPage County's Development Department.

Except for a couple of vacant 50-acre parcels in Glenn Ellyn, "much of the eastern and central parts of the county are pretty well filled up," Mr. Abel says. "West Chicago now finds itself in a fortunate position. The entire area should grow substantially over the next 10 years."